Carte-de-visite three quarter length photograph of Princess Marie (later Maria Pavlovna) of Mecklenburg Schwerin. The subject is shown in three quarter view, facing towards the right of the image. She is seated in an upholstered chair, on the arm of which she rests her right elbow. She is holding her right hand up to her neck. Her hair is arranged in ringlets and she is wearing a cuff bracelet on each wrist and a multiple strand of pearls around her neck. She is wearing a pale coloured, off-the-shoulder gown incorporating a bustle and elaborately trimmed with ruffled lace.  

The subject was born Marie Alexandrine Elisabeth Eleonore of Mecklenburg Schwerin, daughter of Grand Duke Frederick Francis II of Mecklenburg Schwerin and Princess Augusta of Reuss Köstritz. In 1874 she married the Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich of Russia and the couple had four sons and a daughter. She became a prominent hostess in St Petersburg, becoming a rival of the Empress Maria Feodorovna.

On the death of her husband in 1909, she succeeded him as President of the Academy of Fine Arts.